1. Field of the Invention
The present invention generally relates to drawers that slide in and out of a cabinet, and particularly to mechanisms that control the rate at which a drawer slides into a cabinet such that an abrupt stop of the closing motion of the drawer is avoided when it arrives at a fully closed position, and at which a drawer slides away from a cabinet such that an abrupt stop of the opening motion of the drawer is avoided when it arrives at a fully open position.
2. Description of the Prior Art
There are presently available a number of rate controlling mechanisms, both damping and springing mechanisms, that are provided with a drawer or lid of cabinets. Some of the simpler mechanisms include rubber or foam bumpers between the face of the cabinet and the drawer or slide mechanism. Though the bumpers soften the impact of the drawer as the drawer closes, the bumpers are not optimal for heavy or fast moving drawers and not an effective for the abrupt stops.
Other mechanisms include a springing mechanism located proximate the drawer or lid. For example, in U.S. Pat. No. 5,409,308 to Reuter et al., a cabinet is provided with a curved, upward-swinging door with an opening mechanism including a pair of opposed pivot arms, each pivotably connected to a gas spring, which is connected to the end walls of a cabinet. Each pivot arm includes a circular disk portion integrally formed with a tangential arm and a mounting bracket for mounting each pivot arm to door. The rod of the gas spring preferably faces downwardly and the cylinder end preferably faces upwardly, to keep the oil in the cylinder. When opening the door, each arm rotates around a central boss of the circular disk causing the gas spring to generate a force tangential to the rotatably mounted circular disk. The force of the gas spring causes the door to continue to move open. However, the primary motion of the door is swinging, rather than sliding, and the use of a complexly designed arm is necessary to bear the load of the door and the force of the gas spring when swinging open and closed.
Yet, other springing mechanisms are available for drawers that slide. Generally, these mechanisms are integrated with the rails in a complicated manner that often do not allow for minimal modifications to conventional drawer-slide rail systems. Furthermore, many of the slide mechanisms only provide for a soft-close action but do not address both the soft-close action and the soft-open action. One example is U.S. Pat. No. 6,752,478 to Francz, which shows a damping mechanism, preferably a slide and a damper, borne on the pull-out rail toward the front of the drawer and parallel to the sides of a drawer. The damping mechanism travels with the movement of the pull-out rail, and remains inoperative until when the drawer is closing, an abutment presses against the plunger. The abutment presses against the plunger of the damping mechanism, pushing the piston into the cylinder, which causes damping of the drawer and prevents a front panel from striking against the body side walls with a great force. A pull-in device arranged at the rear of a support rail can also be included to couple a central rail, which runs between the pull-out rail and the support rail. The pull-in device pulls the central rail, together with the pull-out rail, further into the furniture carcass, with this movement being dampened by the damping mechanism and consequently providing only a soft-close action.
Thus, there remains a need for a drawer and slide mechanism that allows the drawer to fully close or fully open gradually without an abrupt stop, that is, providing a soft-close action and a soft-open action. There also remains a need to integrate such drawer and slide mechanism with conventional drawer slide systems in a simpler manner.